Susan Heald, a researcher on the impact of violence on learning from the University of Manitoba, came to the ALP to discuss with us the meaning of violence. During our discussion, she offered her definition: “violence is anything that holds you down (Personal Conversation)” I have kept this definition for the past few years because I feel it is broad enough to incorporate the many barriers that disrupt women’s learning. In Dr. Lorna Rivera’s dissertation, Learning Community: An Ethnographic Study of Popular Education and Homeless Women in a Shelter-Based Adult Literacy Program, she states that the women in a shelter-based program encounter poverty-related barriers to their education. Rivera’s core assertion is that these barriers “prevent the women from becoming ‘fully human’” (a term used by Paulo Freire) (Rivera, 2001). If something prevents someone from becoming “fully human,” isn’t it “holding a person down”? I believe that because violence prevents someone from developing, flourishing, or growing as a human being, it can be defined as “anything that holds you down.” Poverty prevents the women students from growing and achieving their full potentials. They are stifled by limits on welfare, childcare, transportation, food, and all of the basic human needs that are required for one just to survive, let alone succeed.

Today one of the women in our program, Pam, a 44-year old single mother with five children, had to leave our program. She was so excited to learn. In her home country, Jamaica, her family could not afford education. When she came to the states, she had to care for her children. She came to our program because not only did she desire to learn, she wanted to obtain her GED to get a job. We really enjoyed having her in the program because, despite her low cognitive and basic skills level, she always had a good attitude when she came to school. She stayed for almost a year, but with little to no money, she was in dire need of a job. She claimed that she couldn’t even get a cleaning job without her GED. She looked everywhere. Finally, last week she got hired as a home health aide (Teacher reflection notes, 2003).

Due to a lack of money in her home country, Pam was not able to receive an education. When she moved to the U.S. seeking a better life for her family, poverty inhibited her “ability to achieve her full potential” yet again. She was “held down” by not being given the opportunity to learn basic reading and writing skills. I do not discount that she learned survival skills, street smarts, and gained life experience. However, she does not possess the very basic skills most people need to succeed in our society today.